


Weird Stuff Happens

by JenNova



Category: Coraline (2009), Gravity Falls, ParaNorman (2012), Psychonauts
Genre: Crossover, Gen, Mystery, Shenanigans, some crossover characters are only mentioned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-21
Updated: 2012-12-21
Packaged: 2017-11-21 20:24:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/601719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JenNova/pseuds/JenNova
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Christmas in Gravity Falls couldn't possibly go wrong...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Weird Stuff Happens

**Author's Note:**

  * For [futuresoon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/futuresoon/gifts).



> Good Yuletide to you, Futuresoon!
> 
> I've tried to incorporate a bunch of different things that you asked for. This is actually the first time I've ever matched on someone so completely thoroughly so this has been a joy to write.
> 
> (For people who aren't familiar with Psychonauts' Razputin - [here](http://psychonauts.wikia.com/wiki/Razputin) he is on the Psychonauts wiki.)

Home seems grey and lifeless after a summer in Gravity Falls. Dipper feels like he can see it on the drive home – colour fading at the edges of his vision, fall reds and golds the only things left behind – and it makes him feel a little empty inside.

School is more boring than usual and Dipper can see that even Mabel is having a hard time impressing her own world over everything. She misses Waddles, he knows, and he does too; to be honest, he'd gotten used to the little guy. But Mom had said _absolutely not_ and nothing they did could convince her otherwise. Mabel Skypes Soos every night so that she can see Waddles, Dipper pretends not to see her tears.

Life at home had been okay, before. At least Dipper remembers it that way – remembers liking his friends and enjoying stuff and playing games. Yet – now his friends are kind of boring, and they don't believe him when he tries to tell them about all the cool stuff that happened over summer, and hanging out doing stuff is dull and he hasn't touched his 3DS in _ages_.

He keeps looking around for weird stuff, catches Mabel doing it too, and nothing really ever seems to happen. They've got Halloween coming up fast and Mabel's planning a new costume after they used this year's original design at Summerween but it just doesn't feel as exciting anymore.

“Life sucks,” Dipper says, falling onto the couch next to Mabel two days before Halloween.

“I know, right?” Mabel is upside down, her feet twitching back and forth as she speaks. “Everything blows right now.”

“Didn't things used to be more fun?” Dipper asks, pulling his cap off and rubbing at his forehead. “I remember things being more fun.”

“Definitely more fun,” Mabel wiggles her toes and Dipper suppresses a laugh. “Also everyone is really boring and nothing happens here, Dipper.”

“I thought I saw a minotaur the other day,” Dipper says absently, messing with his cap. “It was just a really hairy guy wearing a hat.”

Mabel makes a frustrated noise and rolls off the couch. She comes up on her knees and shuffles forward, folds her arms across the cushion and looks up at Dipper.

“How're we going to fix it?” she asks, blowing at a piece of stray hair brushing down over her forehead.

“I really don't know,” Dipper shakes his head. He thinks of the book hidden in a box under his bed and wonders if there'd be anything in there.

Probably not. It was written about Gravity Falls after all.

“Ugh,” Dipper groans again. “This suuuucks.”

“Totally,” Mabel nods, making her own groan in reply.

Halloween is totally, completely and utterly _normal_. No creepy candy monster turns up to try and eat them. All of the people in costumes are just people in costumes. It both sucks and blows in equal measure. Mabel's flattered when people tell her that the matching gnome costumes are super weird and usually Dipper wonders what it would be like to have a less weird sister but this time he doesn't care.

When they get home they Skype Soos together and Mabel curls up from cuteness when she sees that Soos has put Waddles in the matching outfit she made him. Soos surprises Dipper with Wendy and Dipper blushes and makes weird noises and hates everything about himself. Wendy asks if they're coming back for Christmas because there's this kicking town Christmas party she thinks they'd both like. Dipper and Mabel look at each other and shrug. Maybe they can ask Mom and Dad about it tomorrow.

Dipper stays up later than he should just rolling around the internet. He's always looking out for weird stuff, has google alerts set up and everything, but if there's a secret group of people who deal with weird stuff out there Dipper doesn't know how to find them. He's about to give up when, on the 250th page of search results for 'weird stuff keeps happening in my town what can i do to stop it?', he finds a link to a message board called Weird Stuff Happens.

Dipper kinda didn't think those existed anymore.

WSH shows up in the results because of a thread between a guy called ParaNorman and another guy called Goggalor. At least Dipper assumes they're dudes because of their avatars. Anyway – they're checking in with each other to see if anything weird has happened in their towns this Halloween.

Goggalor says all he had to worry about was his best friend trying to explode squirrels again. Dipper flinches back from the screen because, seriously, what? Who does that? It must be a running joke or something because ParaNorman replies with 'oh, what, with his mind?' with what Dipper assumes is sarcasm.

He hopes it's sarcasm.

He thinks it might not be.

ParaNorman goes on to complain about Halloween being the worst time of year for him because ghosts think it's funny to try and mess with him. Ghosts Dipper is _much_ more comfortable with. For a given definition of comfortable. He thinks these guys might be telling the truth, which makes the mind thing terrifying, because they're totally cool about everything they're writing.

He signs up to the board but doesn't say anything – just reads post after post after thread after thread of stuff that's happened. He becomes more and more certain that the site is on the level. There's a girl called ButtonsForEyes and a boy called Wybs and Dipper gets the impression that all of them are around his age from the way they talk.

He puts his location as Gravity Falls when he signs up for no good reason he can think of.

Two weeks later, right in the middle of some early Thanksgiving shopping, Mom turns around and says:

“I know you'll both probably hate this idea but – what do you think about going to your Great Uncle Stan's for Christmas?”

Dipper's mouth drops open and Mabel makes an incredible stream of sound next to him from which the only words he can pick up are 'ohmygod Waddles' and one of those isn't even a real word.

“I know you were probably looking forward to Christmas together but your Grandma's sick and we just don't have enough money for all of us to go across to New York and be with her,” Mom says it quickly, like she thinks they're going to protest. 

Mabel looks at Dipper with the wide eyes of _oh my God, Dipper_ and Dipper gives her the shoulder lift of _I know, right?_ and they both look back at Mom; at her worried eyes and the way she's twisting her hands together.

“Sure, we could do that,” Dipper says, hoping his voice comes out cooler than he feels. Mabel nods frantically next to him, her neon rainbow sweater pulled up over her mouth.

“Oh,” Mom says, looking surprised. “Are you – are you sure about that?”

“Yeah,” Dipper says. He scratches at the back of his head through the cap. “It's not like it was that bad.”

They didn't bother trying to tell their Mom and Dad about the stuff that happened in Gravity Falls when they got home. They wouldn't believe them and it's kind of a sucky feeling not being believed.

“Oh,” Mom says again, the worry clearing from her eyes. “Good. We'll talk to Stan, then.”

“Okay,” Dipper says, nodding. Mom pushes their cart off up the aisle and Dipper and Mabel wait until she's gone around to the next one.

“ _Ohmygosh_ , Dipper!” Mabel pulls her sweater down and Dipper sees that she was hiding a huge grin. “Waddles! Waaaadles!”

Dipper joins her in a celebratory dance and they disturb a few other shoppers by jumping around and laughing too much.

When they get home Dipper has a private message from Goggalor on his WSH account.

_Hey, Dipper_ \- Dipper figures going by Dipper is fine because it's not his real name - _I've heard of Gravity Falls. Is it as weird as everyone says it is?_

Dipper blinks at it for a while before replying, talking about the gnomes they met that first week, and that opens a floodgate – Goggalor asking for more and more stories. Before he knows it he and Goggalor are messaging back and forth regularly. Goggalor gets him to start posting the Story folder – where everyone records the stuff that happens in their town – and slowly the others start talking to him too.

It's sort of awesome, really, because Dipper finally feels like he has someone other than Mabel to talk to that gets it. He gets Mabel to join and she instantly befriends the user called Lily who Dipper is pretty sure is Goggalor's girlfriend. He's not jealous of that, it's not like he thinks about Wendy _all the time_ , except that he kind of is – even when Lily makes fun of Goggalor's username.

Winter break is suddenly upon them and Mabel almost vibrates with excitement next to Dipper in the car. Dipper isn't really that much better, nervously messing with his hair, and they keep looking at each other and breaking into fits of giggles.

Light and colour seeps back into the world the further north they get and, as they turn off the highway onto the succession of winding roads that'll get them to Gravity Falls, Dipper starts to see patches of snow. They don't get much snow where they live, and it never sticks, so he's now doubly excited. He wonders if Grunkle Stan has a sled somewhere in the Mystery Shack.

Grunkle Stan is waiting outside when they arrive, wearing more layers than they've ever seen him in, and he grumbles and complains but he hugs them both when they drop their bags and link arms around him.

There's an oinking noise from somewhere inside the shack and Mabel is gone, leaving everything behind for Dipper to carry. When he gets inside Mabel is on her knees hugging Waddles, who is _much_ bigger than he was when they left, and rubbing her face against him. Waddles leans into her the way a dog would and it makes Dipper smile.

On WSH, there's a post from ButtonsForEyes talking about the snow in her town and Dipper idly asks if she's in Oregon too. Wybs is the one who responds that they both live in Oregon and Dipper thinks it might be cool to meet up with them if he can convince Soos to go on a trip. Maybe next summer?

Wendy comes by the next day and Dipper stops breathing for about five minutes, he thinks. She's got a scarf with reindeer on it and some tinsel tied around her hat. She looks really hot, basically, and Dipper possibly walks into the door when he sees her. Wendy calls him her 'little guy', Dipper nearly chokes on the cool thing he was going to say and Mabel shakes with laughter.

The Christmas party is next weekend, just before Christmas itself, and Mabel helps Dipper pick out the right clothes to impress Wendy. He knows Wendy is still dating Robbie, which sucks, but he's turning thirteen soon and he wants Wendy to see him that way.

Dipper keeps an eye out for anything strange but, aside from Old Man McGucket being weird as usual, there's nothing really. Dipper has a feeling that something's going to happen, though, because something always happens in Gravity Falls when the whole town has plans to do something.

He's right.

“Um, you're seeing this, right?” Mabel asks. Dipper nods wordlessly.

The town square is bright with Christmas decorations and there's stalls from all the local stores and people everywhere. People who aren't moving. It's like the freeze frame at the end of an old TV show – like an episode of Cops Who Are Friends And Fight Crime – and it's freaking Dipper out.

Mabel pokes Grunkle Stan in the gut and Dipper waves a hand in front of Wendy's face and there's absolutely no sign of life in them at all. They wander all around the square trying figure out why they haven't been affected.

“You don't think that 'Lil Gideon might have done this, do you?” Dipper asks when they're back where they started.

“Oh, gosh, I hope not,” Mabel rubs her hands over her face. “Probably, though, he won't take no for answer.”

“He is so creepy,” Dipper twitches slightly at the memory of 'Lil Gideon's stupid face.

“We should go on WSH,” Mabel says. “While we try to figure out what's happening. They could help.”

“Yeah, yeah, you're right,” Dipper says. He doesn't say anything when Mabel slips her hand into his as they run back to the shack. This is mostly because he was going to do it anyway.

The shack has wi-fi so terrible Dipper suspects it might actually be dial up in disguise, but eventually WSH comes up on Grunkle Stan's ancient computer. _Huge problem in Gravity Falls, guys, I need your help._ Mabel runs upstairs and comes back with the book – flipping through the pages for anything about freezing.

“It could be like time's been stopped, couldn't?” she asks, spinning around one of the office chairs. “Blendin could be back.”

“I don't think so,” Dipper shakes his head, refreshing WSH. “We would probably have been affected to.”

Goggalor is the first to reply _What's happening?_ followed less than a minute later by ParaNorman's _What is it?_ Dipper types in a long paragraph about the frozen people and mentions 'Lil Gideon at the end.

_YOU KNOW 'LIL GIDEON?_ comes back from Goggalor followed by _Sorry, it's just that my...people have been looking for him for a while. He's in Gravity Falls?_

_Yeah_ Dipper replies _he hates me and is obsessed with MeowWow_.

_I'm at ButtonsForEyes' house now – I can get to Gravity Falls in half an hour._

_You don't have to come here_ Dipper writes as Mabel leans heavily over his shoulder to watch.

_I do. Just. Wait for me, okay? Don't take any risks, guys._ ParaNorman adds _You should trust him, guys, he knows what he's doing._

_Okay_ Dipper types back. _We'll wait._

They don't wait. Of course they don't. Mabel goes through Grunkle Stan's address book until she finds out where 'Lil Gideon lives and they take off, leaving a note for Goggalor. Dipper realises as he writes it out that he doesn't even know Goggalor's real name. Awkward.

The Gleeful house is quiet, creepily quiet, and Dipper screams a little when Mabel switches on the light and he sees Mr Gleeful standing still in the middle of the room.

He's not proud of the scream and Mabel doesn't bother to stop herself from laughing at him.

“Ha. Ha,” Dipper makes a face at her then they head for 'Lil Gideon's room.

“Uh-oh,” Mabel says when Dipper finds the light switch. There's a book just like Dipper's lying on the bed and it's open to a page that says 'FROZEN PEOPLE'.

“We should – we should go,” Dipper says, grabbing the book.

“Caught you, Dipper Pines,” 'Lil Gideon steps into the room, blocking the door effectively. Dipper spins around and pulls Mabel back to stand beside him. “That's not your property.”

“Oh, yeah?” Mabel says, pulling the book out of Dipper's hands. “Keep it then!”

She throws it at his head and 'Lil Gideon shrieks and ducks. Mabel grabs Dipper's hand and pulls him toward the door, leaping over 'Lil Gideon to get past him. 'Lil Gideon's hand brushes Dipper's pant leg but Mabel gives an extra hard tug on Dipper's hand and yanks him through the door. 

“Why is he even doing this?” Mabel exclaims over the sound of a tantrum being thrown behind them.

“Does he _need a reason_?” Dipper returns, taking the stairs two at a time. “Probably his latest attempt at winning you slash getting the Mystery Shack.”

“Nothing about this makes sense,” Mabel says, bumping against Dipper's back as the reach the bottom of the stairs.

“I know,” Dipper looks at her over his shoulder and she's grinning. Yeah. This is _awesome_. “Come on.”

They run outside and almost into another boy, dodging around him just in time. Dipper bounces off the side of the house and whips around.

The boy has a wide face and is wearing something like an old flying cap and goggles and he's _floating on a giant orange ball of energy_. The ball winks out with a pop and he drops to the ground.

“ _Goggalor?!_ ” Mabel and Dipper say at the same time.

“I said wait for me,” Goggalor says, pulling his goggles up. “And call me Raz.”

“Raz?” Mabel says quietly. She's got that appreciative look in her eye that Dipper knows too well and he gives her the elbow of _not the time_. She pokes her tongue out at him.

“He's inside -” Dipper starts. He's drowned out by the sound of splintering wood. 'Lil Gideon bursts out the hole he's just made in the side of the house and he's surrounded by crackling green energy.

“I thought you smashed the amulet!” Dipper says, grabbing Mabel's hand again. Raz ducks in front of them and throws his hands out and a crackling orange energy shields them from the falling debris.

“I did!” Mabel shakes his arm. “To pieces.”

“There must've been another one,” Dipper says. “Ugh, we should've kept the book.”

“Well sor-ry for getting us out of there,” Mabel grumps, letting go of his hand.

“No, that wasn't – I wasn't -” Dipper waves his hands.

“Can you stop arguing for a minute?” Raz asks, dropping the shield. “What does the amulet do?”

“Telekinesis,” Dipper says. “You need to smash it to stop him.”

They duck as a mailbox flies over their heads.

“No problem,” Raz says, straightening. He spreads his arms and the ball of energy pops back into existence beneath him. He uses it to bounce onto the roof of the Gleeful house, putting him level with 'Lil Gideon. “Hey, Gideon!”

'Lil Gideon whirls around to face him and Raz jumps and nods his head forward violently. A sharp zap of orange energy bursts out of him and hits 'Lil Gideon in the chest. Dipper's mouth drops open as 'Lil Gideon shrieks and drops the amulet. He falls into the bushes next to house and Raz drops down after him, lands on him Dipper thinks. Mabel catches the amulet and throws it to Dipper who recovers enough to smash it against a decorative rock.

“By the authority of the Psychonauts I'm bringing you in for questioning, Gideon,” Raz hauls 'Lil Gideon out of the bushes and holds him at arms length as he struggles.

“You'll hear from my lawyers!” 'Lil Gideon says, swinging his little arms around.

“Yeah, of course we will,” Raz rolls his eyes and turns to grin at Dipper. “Good to meet you in person, Dipper.”

“You too,” Dipper smiles back. “This is my sister, Mabel.”

“Hi,” Mabel says, trying to make it sound flirtatious. She throws in a wave that Dipper thinks could be called 'coy' at a push. Raz doesn't seem to notice as he waves back.

They lock 'Lil Gideon up in the Sheriff's station and Raz helps them use the book to reverse the spell on the townspeople. Raz stays for the party, waiting for his superior officers to come get him and 'Lil Gideon, and Dipper and Mabel quiz him about the Psychonauts. He leaves with promises to stay in touch properly now that they've actually met and tells them to go and see ButtonsForEyes. Her real name is Coraline, apparently, and she's really cool.

Christmas after that is pretty quiet – Grunkle Stan actually gets them really awesome presents – and before they know it Mom and Dad are picking them up to take them home. Mabel rubs her face all over Waddles to say goodbye. Wendy comes by to say goodbye and Dipper blushes when she pulls his cap off and ruffles his hair. It's pretty great.

“It wasn't too terrible, was it?” Mom asks when they're half way home.

Dipper and looks at Mabel and grins. Mabel's grin says _best Christmas ever_.

“It was okay,” Dipper says, shrugging. Mabel stifles a giggle next to him.

“Oh, good,” Mom says. “Because we talked to Great Uncle Stan and he says it's okay for you come back in summer.”

Dipper makes a small fist pump and then low-fives Mabel out of sight of their parents. Summer's going to be awesome.

**Author's Note:**

> No squirrels were harmed in the making of this story.
> 
> [Play Psychonauts.](http://www.psychonauts.com/) You'll never regret it.


End file.
